Envy
by demidazzle
Summary: The agents at NCIS should know that when things get calm, something is about to shake their world to its core. A lunch outside the office sets off a chain of events that lead to tension and drama between McGee and Abby, and secrets not even Gibbs knows.
1. Criminal Hibernation Season

"Your meals will be out shortly." the waiter turned away from the table that the three NCIS agents were seated around.

It seemed like it was criminal-hibernation season. There hadn't been any major cases in at least a month. That's what gave Tony, Ziva, and McGee time to go out for lunch that day at Co-Co's café, a new place that had opened up only a few blocks away from NCIS headquarters. They'd chosen to seat themselves out on the patio, beneath the large umbrella protruding from one of the tables. It was hot out, just like it had been for the past week or so. Because of this, Ziva was fanning herself with her hand.

"I am sweating like a hen." Ziva sighed, leaning forwards as if the shade grew cooler the closer one got to the umbrella.

"Pig, Ziva." McGee corrected her, "Sweating like a pig."

"I do not care!" She snapped at him. The heat had been making Ziva irritable all week. It was doing that to a lot of people. "The point is, I am hot."

"Speaking of hot…" Tony mumbled while a blonde waitress walked past the table, her too-short skirt swishing around her thighs as she swayed her hips. He wasn't really speaking to anyone else at the table. It seemed to be that he was speaking more to some secret alter-ego of his, who was apparently just as obsessed with the female anatomy as he was.

Ziva reached over, hitting Tony's arms but letting out one of her laughs that seemed to be growing increasingly rare this week. Tony gave her a smile before turning his attention to Tim whose interest had been pulled away from the table by his cell phone. Abby had text messaged him. Quick as a flash, Tony reached over and snatched the phone out of his hands.

"What do you got here, Probie?" he asked, his eyes scanning across the screen.

_From: Abby_

_Can you give me a ride home tonight, Timmy? My car's at my place._

The phone was handed to Ziva who read the message before giving it back to McGee who was leaning over the table, trying to snatch it back. His ears had gained a red tint while Tony chuckled at him.

"Oh yes, you and Abby came to work together." Ziva said, recalling seeing the two walk into the NCIS building just as she locked her car doors that morning.

"Forgetting rule number twelve, Probie?"

"We're not dating." McGee rolled his eyes and busied himself with responding to Abby.

Their waiter interrupted them then, setting three different beverages in front of their respected agents. They all took a few moments to take their first few sips before Tony picked the conversation back up.

"I think sleeping with co-workers falls under the same rule." he said.

Tim was quick with his protest of, "We didn't sleep together!" he took a deep breath, calming himself. "We ran into each other last night, at a bar. We were just going to get something to eat, but we ended up having a few drinks. I didn't want her driving, so she stayed over at my house. On my couch. There, happy Tony? Do you need the rest of my life story with that?"

"You're getting defensive, McGee." Ziva pointed out. She wasn't looking up at Tim though, she was staring down at the soda in front of her like it had just sprouted legs and was getting ready to hop away. "This is diet soda." She said disapprovingly. "I did not ask for diet soda." She turned her head, looking around until she spotted the waiter. Her attempts to wave him over to their table were all in vain as he just glanced at her then walked in the opposite direction.

Tony and McGee threw each other a nervous glance as Ziva's eyes turned to two slits on her face, glaring at the café door that the waiter had just disappeared through. The Israeli woman stood up from her seat suddenly. The hot sun had her hair falling limply from it's hair tie and beads of sweat clinging to both her forehead and the skin of her upper chest that her white tank top left exposed. Tony reached over to her, knowing she could have a temper sometimes but also knowing what the heat had been doing to her lately. Irritability could possibly lead to bad decisions, and nobody wanted bad decisions being made. Especially not by a trained assassin. His clammy hand gripped one of hers and she looked down at him with one sharp jerk of her head. Immediately he retracted his hand, clearing his throat ,then trying to change the subject.

"So, our food should be out soon." he said.

Ziva ignored him, grabbing her glass off of the table in a manner that caused some of the diet soda to slosh over the edge of it, splashing onto the table before a few drops bounced up to hit both of the men she'd been seated with. "I will be back in a moment." she informed the two before striding away, and entering café.

Tim grabbed a few napkins from the dispenser next to the umbrella's pole and began to wipe up the mess that Ziva had made. Tony leaned back in his chair, tipping it onto it's back two legs and rocking himself in a leisurely manner.

"Think she'll kill him?" he asked, interlocking his fingers behind his head with his arms in a position that looked like he was about to do a few sit-ups.

"She's Ziva." was McGee's response. "No way to know."

"Think we should go in and make sure she doesn't?"

"He was a jerk…"

Just then the café door was once again opened. The two men expected to see Ziva walking out, a triumphant look on her face and her new soda grasped in her hand, possibly a bit of blood on her shirt. It wasn't Ziva however. It was their waiter, carrying three plates towards their table.

"Here we are." he said, setting down the plates then walking away quickly to another table.

McGee was ready to push his food aside and wait for Ziva's return before he started to eat. Tony wasn't as much of a gentleman. He picked up his burger and took a large bite. His cheeks bulged slightly as he chewed. Shrugging, the more polite of the gentlemen picked up one of his French fries from his plate and slipped it past his lips.

"McGee." Tony said, grabbing Tim's attention. He went on, "You eat like a wimp." With that said he grabbed several of his own fries and pushed them into his mouth all at once. After he swallowed he told Tim, "That's how men eat."

"Weird, that's how the pigs on my uncle's farm eat." McGee came back with.

Tony opened his mouth, ready to scold the probie for mouthing off, but he didn't get a chance to say anything. A shrill scream made it's way through the outside walls of Co-Co's café and met the agents' ears. Within seconds they'd abandoned their plates and were bursting through the doors of the building. That hadn't been an "Oh my goodness, you startled me" sort of scream. That was a scream that meant something was wrong. The two knew enough to know the difference between them. A crowd had formed around the doorway to one of the bathrooms. Hands readily on the guns in the holsters, McGee and Tony pushed their way through the crowd, their badges drawn.

"Special agents! Out of the way!" Tony barked, finally breaking through the last barrier of bodies and getting through the door of the womens' restroom. "Good God." his hand dropped to his side and he threw a glance over at McGee before looking back at the site before him.

Ziva lay on the floor, her arms and legs splayed in a manner that obviously meant she hadn't willingly or even knowingly laid herself like that. The blood that trickled from an unseen wound underneath her hair was pooling and flowing in a small stream across the floor, moving towards the door where her partners stood. McGee was on his knees in a flash, checking his friend's pulse and her breathing. Tony followed suit, dropping onto the floor.

"I'll take care of Ziva." He told Tim, "Check the bathroom stalls. There's no windows in here, whoever did this has gotta be hiding."

Tim nodded, pulling out his gun, moving to the closest stall, and leaning down to look for any signs of feet or a shadow before pushing it open and aiming his gun inside. There was nothing. He moved on, checking the next stall, and then the next. When he went to check the fourth stall, he saw it. Not in there though. In the stall next to it. The fifth one. Feet were planted solidly on the floor. A pair of red heeled shoes covered the feet. McGee moved to the side of the stall.

"Come out with your hands up!" he spoke clearly and loudly to the person behind the door.

Tony had removed his short sleeved shirt and carefully lifted Ziva in order to press the shirt against her head and stop the bleeding. He yelled for someone to call an ambulance before looking back at his unconscious friend. He looked up when McGee shouted at a person in one of the stalls. He was at a bad angle though, and as McGee opened the door he couldn't see inside it. Something was wrong though. He could see it in the way that Probie froze in his tracks, and slumped his shoulders. He lowered his weapon, placing it back in its holster.

"Someone in there?" Tony asked.

"Yeah." Tim responded, feeling his own face growing slightly paler.

Tony motioned for one of the onlookers to take over his spot aiding to Ziva, showing them how to hold the shirt onto her head so she didn't bleed to death. He stood up from the floor once he was sure the person was doing it right, then strode quickly over to McGee, his hand ready on his gun just by sheer instinct. There was no need for it though. He saw that when he got close enough to see what McGee was seeing. The person in the stall was no threat. If anyone asked how he knew that, he'd have to tell them that her pale face, wide, blank eyes, and the cut running across her throat that had been crudely sewn back together was a dead giveaway.


	2. I Want Answers

"Does somebody want to tell me how the hell this happened?" Gibbs demanded to know as the ambulance carried Ziva out of the building on a stretcher.

"Well…um…Boss," McGee spoke up when Tony turned his back to Gibbs and continued snapping pictures of the scene, pretending he hadn't heard anything. "We were waiting for our food, and Ziva got the wrong soda. She went inside to get it changed and then…there was a scream. That's when Tony and I went running into the building and we found everything." Tim explained in that rushed and stuttering voice that he often used when placed under the pressure of one of Gibbs's hard stares.

Gibbs seemed to accept Tim's explanation and looked away from him, allowing McGee to get back to work. Ducky was examining the dead body inside of the stall it was found in.

"What do we know, Ducky?" asked Gibbs.

"Well," Ducky responded, "The killer was either extremely rushed, or extremely unprofessional. It's obvious by the poor job they did stitching her neck back together."

"I'm more interested in how and when she died." Gibbs responded with, stepping into the stall to get a closer look at the body.

"I'd say that she died no more than two hours ago. As for the cause of death, I'd find it logical to conclude that the slit across her throat was her demise." Ducky then went on with, "I can tell you this, Jethro: it is unlikely that our victim was killed here. We've yet to find a trace of blood, aside from that on the edge of the sink and the blood from Ziva."

"Why are ruling out the blood on the sink as being the victims?" Gibbs questioned and followed Ducky from the stall the doctor walked out of it.

Ducky approached the sink, side-stepping Tony as he did so. He pointed to the blood found on the smooth and rounded edge of the white sink. "If you'll notice the placement of the sink in relation to the blood showing us where Special Agent David's head landed, it's a safe assumption to say that Agent David fell and hit her head on the sink, explaining how she was rendered unconscious."

"I don't want assumptions Ducky, I want answers." Gibbs was obviously annoyed.

He always snapped at people more often when he was angry. The heat didn't do anything to help the situation. The sun seemed to have pushed its way through the walls and felt as if it were about to make the blood on the floor begin to boil.

"As do I, Jethro." Ducky wasn't at all phased by Gibbs's slightly harsh tone. "As do I."

Tim had gotten to work on sifting through the garbage bin in search of evidence. His hands protected and covered by gloves, the agent pulled out every piece of trash one-by-one and examined it. The witty banter on the crime scene was at a minimum. The team seemed to be having bad luck with its female members. Kate was killed, Abby's life had been threatened numerous times, and now Ziva had been found unconscious and bleeding on a bathroom floor.

Something caught Tim's eye suddenly. Something that was a shade of dark red that closely resembled the pool of Ziva's blood on the floor. He reached into the garbage can, ready to pick it up before it dawned on him what he was about to touch. His arm jerked back like he'd just been bitten and he crinkled his nose. Unbeknownst to Tim, Gibbs had taken a moment to look up and see how the garbage search was going. Gibbs took a step towards Tim and looked down into the trashcan, immediately spotting the used tampon that had made McGee pull back.

"Never lived with a woman, have you McGee?" he asked.

"I- um- no, Boss." McGee answered.

A laugh rose from the other side of the room where Tony was now photographing the dead woman. "That's a given, don't you think , Boss?"

"Back to work DiNozzo." Gibbs ordered, not amused.

Tony did so, the smile slowly slipping off of his lips and disappearing. The special agent got back to the task at hand: photographing a dead woman seated on a toilet. Yes, she was fully dressed, in a blood-red business suit to be specific, but none the less, she was on a toilet.

"With cases of slit throats, I can't help but think of an actor I once heard about who went to act out a suicide scene with what he believed to be a fake knife, and ended up actually killing himself on stage." Ducky stated to nobody in particular. "It seems that somehow the prop knife was switched with a real knife, causing the poor lad to fatally slit his throat."

"How'd the audience react when they saw all the blood?" Tim asked without looking up from the garbage can, not wanting to pause in his work and push one of Gibbs's buttons.

Ducky sighed, "That's part of the tragedy in it. They applauded. They thought that it was all special effects. Imagine that, people applauding at the fact that you've slit your throat and you can't even shout out for help."

"Maybe you all don't get it." Gibbs spoke up suddenly. "We've got an agent down. Now, I want you done with the scene and getting to work on figure out who the hell did this within an hour. Got it?"

"But boss-" Tony's words were cut short.

"One hour!" With that Gibbs was walking out the door, a now-cold coffee in hand.

* * *

It took the team almost exactly forty minutes to finish with the crime scene. Ziva was safe and at the hospital, but she out like a light and not showing the slightest sign of waking up. She was vulnerable in that state, which was something none of the team had ever even bothered to imagine happening before. The words "Ziva" and "vulnerable" didn't belong in the same sentence, unless it was being stated how they didn't belong in the same sentence. It didn't take a genius to figure out that something abnormal had happened in that bathroom while McGee and Tony were outside. Ziva was- well…Ziva. There could only be a handful of people on the planet that could take her down without having a weapon, and the only injury on her body that couldn't have been caused by a human hand was the fracture on her skull that Ducky had no other choice than to assume had come from hitting her head on the sink. She had a black eye and Ducky had found bruising on her abdomen before the ambulance arrived. The strange part was that Ducky seemed to think that the bruises had been given to her _after_ she'd been taken down. That still left the question of how she'd hit her head.

"Timothy McGee," Abby said loudly as Tim entered her lab, "You are the third person to come down here since you guys got back from lunch, and I have yet to be told what the heck is going on."

"Abs-"

"Eh!" she cut McGee off with an incoherent noise. "That's the same tone Gibbs and Ducky started their sentences with. I want answers, Timmy."

"Abs-"

Abby cut his words short again, "Let me finish!" She raised the Caf-Pow that was currently in her hands to her lips and placed the straw between her lips, sucking it. The noise that filled the room let McGee know that the Caf-Pow was empty now. "I want answers…and a new Caf-Pow, or else I'm going to plaster that picture of you that I took on my cell phone all over this place. Oh, and I'll personally hand one to Tony."

"Gibbs would kill us both." Tim pointed out, shifting the weight of the box of evidence in his hands that had been one of his main reason for going down to Abby's lab.

"Very true." She stepped closer to Tim now as she moved to throw away the Caf-Pow container. "But, I could always hack into your computer and email a copy to your mother."

"You wouldn't dare." His eyes narrowed and Abby's did the same in return.

"Try me."

They held each other's gaze in an intense staring contest for what felt like a long while, until finally McGee blinked and looked away. He sighed, finally setting down the evidence box on the table beside him. He crossed his arms and reluctantly explained the day's events to Abby. She worried a lot, and he hated to make her worry. However, he more especially would hate for his mother to see the picture he recalled Abby having taken the previous night. The reason being that it hadn't been taken at a very flattering angle, among other things.

"Oh. My. God." was Abby's shocked reaction when he'd finished the story. With her jaw slightly dropped she looked at McGee, then at the box of evidence, then back at McGee again. "Oh my God. Not again. Damn it, not again!" The tears in her eyes were obvious and her lips and formed a pout. She was blinking hard and shaking her head.

"What do you mean not again?" Tim had to admit that he was a little confused.

"First Kate, then Jen… now Ziva?" Her face dropped suddenly and, if possible, grew three shades paler. "I'm next."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa." Tim placed his hands on Abby's shoulders and leaned his face close to hers. "First of all, Ziva isn't dead. She's in a coma. And second, even if she had died, you would not be next, okay? Gibbs wouldn't let that happen. I-…I wouldn't let that happen." He wished that he hadn't said that. It sounded corny. As a cover up, he quickly added on, "And neither would Tony. You're safe, Abs."

Abby had on that knowing smile of hers as McGee started to blush and she placed her arms around his necking, giving one of her usual hugs.

"Thanks Timmy." she said.

"No problem." Quickly, to lighten the mood, he added, "Isn't this a yellow light, Abby?"

"Very funny Timmy." Abby pulled away, sticking out her tongue at McGee. "But, you're forgetting something."

"What's that?"

"I run red lights for fun."

It was meant to be funny, and Tim knew that. The problem was, a part of his brain couldn't help but to flash back to the previous night. The blush that was yet to leave his face grew more intense and he looked away. As if she could read his mind, Abby reached over and slapped his arm.

"Quit reading so far into things." she laughed.

"Can't help it." Tim gave a shrug and his eyes darted towards the doorway.

With his luck, Gibbs would be walking into the lab any second in the middle of this conversation. Then, he'd find himself in a situation similar to Ziva's, except he would most defiantly end up dead. A smile stayed on Abby's lips as she turned away and started to remove the evidence from the box on the table. It was blood samples, and suspicious garbage mostly. One thing was for sure, they didn't have much to work off of on this case. They wouldn't until Tony got back to the office with the witness reports.

"I had fun last night." her words were soft, like she was embarrassed to even say them. But she had and they made McGee's throat go dry.

"I- erm…me too." It was right then that he realized just how too-often he stuttered.

Abby let out a laugh, "Relax Timmy." She said and pointed to the small screen next to her computer monitor that she used to communicate with Ducky., "Gibbs is down with Ducky in autopsy, and the sound is off."

It was true. With the way that the camera was angled, Tim could clearly see Ducky and Gibbs speaking with one another and couldn't hear a word they were saying. He released a bit of the air that he'd been holding in his lungs and could relax a bit.

"I really wasn't expecting anything to happen. I mean, I meant it when I agreed that we should stop a while back…" he trailed off, waiting for reaction.

The young forensics scientist nodded her head of black hair, "Me too. But, honestly, I think I needed that."

"Same here." McGee agreed and that seemed to be the end of their chat. No discussion of whether or not the previous night was going to happen again. There was just an awkward pause that turned into a stretch of awkward silence. "I should probably get back to work." He started towards the door.

"Don't forget the second half of our deal!" Abby called after him. "Bring me a Caf-Pow or your mom sees the picture!"

* * *

Down in autopsy, Gibbs was growing impatient that Ducky wouldn't just get straight to the point.

"Did you find anything?" he asked for the third time as another story about a throat slit victim ended.

"Not with the external examination, but I was just about to begin the autopsy." Ducky said then added, "In fact, Jimmy, begin the autopsy! I'll join you in a minute."

"Right away Dr. Mallard." the ever-eager Jimmy Palmer said.

"Now, Jethro," Ducky placed a hand on his colleague's shoulder, "Might I suggest taking a moment to take a deep breath."

"Why would I need that?" Gibbs knew exactly where Ducky was going with this, and he didn't' like it.

"You're a bit wound up, don't you think?"

"I'm fine Ducky."

"It's just-"

"I'm fine."

The autopsy room fell to silence and Ducky dropped his hand from Gibbs's shoulder. Gibbs, figuring that he had all the information he could get from Ducky at the moment, turned to leave. He stopped, however, when Jimmy's voice met his ears.

He said, "Um…Mr. Mallard, Special Agent Gibbs, you might want to have a look at this."


	3. Carla Camden

"I don't get it Bert." Abby said, leaning against her lab table which was void of anything but her stuffed hippo. "Why doesn't anybody ever think that they can tell me anything? It's not like I'm going to have a mental breakdown or something if just once they decide to tell me what the heck is going on around here. I mean, sure, I did start crying when McGee told me about Ziva, but that doesn't count because I only started crying because I jumped to the conclusion that she was dead." She sighed, now resting her elbow on the table and her chin on her hand. "What do you think?"

"I think that I'm going to hurt McGee for making you worry." a voice came from behind her.

A smile slipped onto Abby's face as she stood up straight suddenly. The eccentric forensic scientist picked up the hippo and said with mock surprise, "Why Bert, you sound an awful lot like Gibbs."

Gibbs walked around Abby, into her view and set a Caf-Pow on her lab table, along with a small evidence bag, containing a bloody USB drive. Abby set down Bert and jumped up and down in place, clapping her hands excitedly.

"Gibbs, I love you! I've been dying of boredom." She froze when he gave her a slightly reproaching look. She froze and took a deep breath to calm herself. "Right. No clapping at bloody USB drives. Rule number…Ya know, that isn't a rule."

"What's a USB drive?" Gibbs watched as Abby didn't respond but pointed to the blood coated object inside the evidence bag. "Well yeah, I figured that. But what is it."

Abby picked up the bag and examined its contents as she spoke. "It's a little chip that stores documents, videos, pictures, etcetera. You plug it into your computer…Dare I ask why it's covered in blood?"

Gibbs was already starting towards the door now. "Found it inside of a woman's neck. I want the woman's names, finger prints, and whatever the hell is on that UBS drive."

"USB!…Gibbs." It was pointless to say, because he was already gone.

It was hardly twenty minutes later when Tim and Tony were walking through Abby's lab door after getting a call from her. Gibbs was busy speaking with Vance. What about, he'd failed to mention. That left the other two men to figure out what Abby was so frantic to have them know.

"My god you guys, this is terrible." she said, her hands shaking slightly and her face showing that she was obviously troubled.

"Did you find a match for the DNA?" Tony asked, hurrying to her computer screen. "Do you know who our dead Jane Doe is?"

He'd been acting weird since they'd gotten back to the office and realized that they had basically no leads on who was responsible for putting Ziva in the hospital. He was absolutely nothing like himself. He hadn't cracked a single joke or made the slightest remark against McGee. He just focused on his work.

"I didn't match any DNA, but I do know who are Jane Doe is.." Abby responded, earning a confused expression from both of the boys. She ignored the looks and went over to her computer, bringing up a screen containing two files. "I took blood from the drive, checked for prints- there were none- and yadda yadda yadda. Then I put the drive in my computer." She double clicked the first file and a picture of a driver's license popped up on the screen. "Does that look like your Jane Doe?"

"Either that, or it's her twin." McGee responded, nodding.

Tony leaned close to the screen, reading what was written on the license in the picture, "Carla Camden."

"What's the other file?" Tim spoke up again.

Abby now bit her lip, turning back to the computer. She brought the mouse to the second file but she hesitated. It seemed like she was just going to give up on clicking the file. Tim put a hand on her shoulder.

"What is it Abs?" he asked.

"A video." She responded, then went on. "I've seen a lot of messed up things, working around here. But this just…gets to me."

Tony didn't want to be as patient and understanding as McGee was at the moment. He moved Abby's hand out of the way and took the mouse from her control, quickly double clicking the second file. It was a video that popped up. Tim's hand remained on his friend's shoulder as it started to play. A woman who, despite being blindfolded was so obviously Carla Camden, was seated in a chair, a baby being held in her arms as her body shook with the sobs she was giving.

"P- please." she cried, "Just let me go!" She paused, taking in a shaking breath. "Just let my baby go. Please!"

There was laughter, and the screen went black as silence filled the room. Now Tony and Tim knew why Abby had looked so unnerved when they'd walked into the room.

"Has Gibbs seen this?" Tony asked, starting towards the doorway.

"No." Abby replied just as Tony walked out of the room.

Abby's eyebrows were drawn close together as she stared at the black video screen. Tim closed the page with the video on it and slid his arm over his friend's shoulder, giving her a light squeeze to his side.

"You okay?" He asked her.

Abby shook her head. "I hate this job sometimes."

It was around one in the morning when the last of the team finally decided to call it quits for the day. The weather outside suited the feelings that had spread inside of the building. Rain was falling hard and Tony's windshield wipers were working double time to keep his view of the road clear. As soon as he was home safely he stripped out of his clothes, leaving himself in just a pair of boxers, and climbed into bed. He was asleep within minutes.

Tony groaned, rolling onto his side to look at the alarm clock next to his bed. 4:39, is what it read. There was a loud boom filling his house. A boom like someone knocking on the door.

"Who the hell is up at this hour?" He asked, obviously to himself because he was the only one in the house.

He stumbled through the dark, only getting glimpses of what was ahead of him when lightning flashed outside. He made it down four or five steps perfectly fine and stumbled on the one after that. His feet slid out from under him and he slid down the ten or eleven steps on his behind. He let out an irritated grunt and pulled himself to his feet while rubbing a sleep-filled eye. The knocking had stopped but he continued towards the door for fear that whoever it was hadn't given up and left, but instead was just waiting to knock again.

It took the agent a minute to figure out how to unlock his own front door because he still seemed to be half asleep.

"What do you w-" he started when he was finally pulling open the door, but nobody was there.

With an eyebrow raised he tried to peer through the rain to see who it was, but all he could see was an empty sidewalk, lit up by a few dim street lights. Tony went to step forwards out of his door and maybe get a better look around, but his foot hit something and suddenly a cry went up into the air. Tony's gaze quickly dropped downwards. An infant's car seat sat on his doorstep with a blanket covering it. The agent leaned down and pulled back the blanket, revealing a baby. Its jaw was dropped and its face wrinkled as it let out a series of loud cries. Tucked beside it was a white envelope. Tony leaned down, picking up the envelope and examining its contents. He was wide awake now.

He left the baby in the car seat on his living room floor after flicking on a few lights, and went off to find his telephone. He punched Gibbs's cell phone number into the phone and held it to his ear. The baby was still crying and Tony finally took the blanket off from over it and left it off. The infant had the beginnings of brown curls sprouting from its head. Quite honestly, Tony wasn't sure whether it was a boy or a girl.

"Dinozzo, are you trying to give me a reason to kill you?" were Gibbs's first words when he finally answered his phone the second time Tony tried to call him. "Is that a baby in the background?"

"Yeah, Boss. Somebody left it on my doorstep." Tony replied.

Gibbs heaved a loud sigh, "Then call child protective services, not me. Goodnight, Dinozzo."

"Boss, before you go, I've got a question."

"What?" Gibbs was obviously far past annoyed now.

"How do you think child protective services will react when I show them the thumb drive and picture of a dead Carla Camden that was with the baby?"


End file.
